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Monica's Gang
Monica's Gang or Monica and Friends (Portuguese: Turma da Mônica) is a Brazilian comic book series and media franchise created by Mauricio de Sousa. The series originated in a newspaper comic strip in which the protagonists were Blu (Bidu) and Franklin (Franjinha), launched by the newspaper Folha da Manhã in 1959. As the series continued, the central characters became Jimmy Five (Cebolinha) and Monica (Mônica), both of whom began to appear in eponymous series in addition to the renamed Monica’s Gang. The characters and comics were subsequently adapted into, among other media, an animated television series; as well as films, most of which are anthologies. The stories revolve around the adventures of Monica and her friends in the fictional Lemon Tree Neighborhood (Bairro do Limoeiro) of São Paulo, inspired by the neighborhood of Cambuí in Campinas and the city of Mogi das Cruzes, where de Sousa spent his childhood. The Monica’s Gang umbrella title also encompasses Chuck Billy 'n' Folks, Tina's Pals, Lionel's Kingdom and Bug-a-Booo, among other series. Monica's Gang was previously published by Abril and Globo and has been published by Panini Comics since 2007. In 2008, a spin-off series, Monica Teen, was created in a manga style and features the characters as teenagers. The Monica's Gang series has an extensive amount of main and secondary characters. It has as main protagonists Monica, Jimmy Five, Smudge, Maggy and Chuck Billy (the latter derived from the Chuck Billy 'n' Folks) and each has its own comic. Other characters from other series created by Mauricio de Sousa are also included on Monica's, making crossovers or quotations from each other in several stories,among several other characters. The main setting of the stories is the fictional neighborhood of "Limoeiro" in São Paulo. Most stories focus on the daily lives of the main characters and occasionally on the secondary characters; the humour usually uses various types of repetitions, allusions, appeals to the nonsense, paranomasias, sarcasm and metalanguage. The stories with Monica and Jimmy Five revolve around the conflict between the two. Jimmy Five is a troublemaker and bully who always tries to scold Monica or steal her stuffed bunny to give knots in its ears (usually having Smudge or another boy accomplice), always having Monica get her revenge by hitting him with her stuffed bunny, often leaving him bruised and with black eyes. Often Jimmy Five makes plans against her with various traps, sometimes using Franklin's inventions or talking Smudge into helping, but he always loses to Monica at the end. Smudge's stories usually focus on his penchant for dirt and mess and his fear of water, without ever having taken a bath in life, and constantly being threatened by villains or his friends to take a bath whenever he gets away with a result at the end of the story. The stories with Maggy generally focus on her gluttony, with a superhuman ability to eat more than a normal person without ever getting fat and sometimes stealing food from her friends. Among the villains are Captain Fray, a supervillain with the power to control garbage and dirt, and Lord Raider, a space rabbit whose first appearance was in the movies. A joke often breaks the fourth wall. Category:Monica's Gang Category:Globo Category:Cartoon Network